1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to the treatment of food processing wastewater. More particularly, the present invention provides a chemical treatment method that effectively removes fat, blood, tissue and other solids from food processing wastewater.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Everyday the food processing industry produces many tons of food processing waste. Such food processing waste contaminates the water stream flowing through the food processing system. For example, poultry farm waste water effluents are enriched with fat, oil, blood and other solids from the poultry process. These by-products, such as fat, blood, and tissue, are typically present in the waste water in a range of several hundred to tens of thousands of ppm.
For economic as well as regulatory reasons, the food processing community faces never-ending concerns regarding the disposal and recycling of food processing waste water. The removal of such by-products is critical from an environmental standpoint. In fact, the United States Environmental Protection Agency has placed tight restrictions on total oil and solids content in water that is be discharged into public drinking water supplies or into open bodies of water.
The removal of such solids is also critical to the established discharge limits for total dissolved solids (TDS), chemical oxygen demand (COD), biological oxygen demand (BOD) and total organic carbon (TOC) into local sewers and rivers. In addition to the EPA's severe discharge limits, food processing industries must also be concerned with local city ordinances.
As an alternative to discharging treated water into a water stream or the like, recycling of the water back into the processing system provides a cost efficient system. However, in order to recycle such waste water, the solids content and so forth must be effectively removed in order to provide pure water back into the system. Accordingly, the same concerns that are present with respect to the removal of such solids for EPA standards exist for recycling purposes as well.
Therefore, a need exists for a treatment system that addresses all the environmental concerns presented by food processing waste, while at the same time being environmentally friendly.